Braid
- The
Age of Octeen
Sophomore
full-length from Champaign-Urbana band marked by its passionate
vocals, excellent wordplay, dueling guitars,
and a relentless rhythm section; powerful sounds with a heart
of gold. Once the heir apparent to the post-Fugazi/Jawbox throne
of emo-whatever, Braid decided to call it quits in the Summer
of ‘99. Braid’s line-up for “The Age Of Octeen” features singer/guitarist
Bob Nanna (Hey Mercedes!, Friction, The City On Fim, and The
Sky Corvair), bassist Todd Bell (Hey Mercedes!, lowercase n,
Mary Me, and Grand Theft Autumn Records co-owner), Parasol
Mailorder mainstay drummer Roy Ewing (Very Secretary, Days
In December, lowercase n, Mary Me, and Grand Theft Autumn Records
co-owner), and guitarist Chris Broach (L’Spaerow, The Firebird
Band/The Firebird Suite/The Firebird Project, and Lucid Records
owner).
Tightly wound passion with powerfully anthemic vocals & insightful lyrics on
2nd album from this pre-Hey Mercedes band. Confident & catchy stuff indeed. A+
Like Jawbox, Jawbreaker, Fugazi, Shudder To Think, Gauge, and Sunny Day Real
Estate? Love Braid.
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“Thank God that good, clean-cut punk (the Hanes’ basic-colored-pocket-T-shirt
kind) still scratches a musical itch in this fickle world. Don’t know about you,
but I get nervous when I hear a lot of that lo-fi, pathetic aesthetic crap; makes
me want to put on an old Circus Lupus CD and take clippers to my hair. When I
get in such a mood, bands like Braid restore my faith; the Urbana, IL quartet
lays a foundation of jangly guitar and frenetic bass, gravels it up with some
jazzy drums and paves the whole thing over with lots of vocals... Love it. Don’t
let anyone tell you there aren’t any great new bands out there as long as Braid
is still wound together.” - Magnet
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“This music just drips with honest emotion... it has a high melodic content -
no screaming noise, here. The music ranges from quiet and sometimes minimalist,
to epic rage, from smooth beautiful pop-like music, to post-hardcore edged stuff...
Just as the music is intense and beautiful and honest, the musical skills of
the band members don’t disappoint. This band is tight and skillful... [T]his
is a must-have album for all music lovers." - Jersey Beat
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From All Music Guide:
Braid's second full-length, The Age of Octeen, exudes a passion and roughness
reminiscent of high school. From the boyish shouted/sung vocals to the straightforward,
punk-influenced guitars to the lyrics dealing with failed relationships and memories,
the album has an unpolished, garage-band energy. Although the album has that
raw quality, there isn't a weak track on it. The first track, "My Baby Smokes," starts
with quiet, mumbled lyrics, rolling drums, and understated guitars before bursting
into wailing vocals backed by a wall of sound. "American Typewriter" is a little
more complex with its tight, staccato drumming and quick guitar riffs. "Chandelier
Swing" and "Autobiography" close the album on a quieter, more thoughtful note.
Overall, The Age of Octeen is a solid effort that manages to capture the abandon
and freedom of being 19.
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“In the late '90s there was a band from Chicago that dressed up quirky rock music
with smart-alec lyrics. Called Braid, they were regarded as one of the more original
purveyors of a mid-west emo sound due to such influential records as The Age
Of Octeen, Frame and Canvas. And then in the spring of 2000 they broke up. Braid's
popularity has, remarkably, increased ever since…” Chart Attack
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“For those unfamiliar with Braid, this band bridged the gap between chaotic urgency
and more melodic emotion. They have been lumped in with both the emo and post-hardcore
categories. Their music started out angry and loose, with screaming and constant
time changes, and it developed into songs that are catchy, clever, and fun. The
band has been listed as an influence by countless bands, despite their relatively
short life, and so this provides a proper celebration of their musical lives… The
Age of Octeen, Braid's second full-length, is a transition between their old,
very rough and shouted incoherent music and their newer, more melodic and well-sung
music. The catchy hooks of Frames and Canvas are here, as are the raspy, sung-said
vocals. There's some little jazzy numbers that are kinda nice, showing maturity.
This album lacks the cohesiveness that Frames and Canvas features, but it's bounds
above their first full-length…” Delusions Of Adequacy
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"There really is a lot of stuff happening on the underground level right now," says
Bob Nanna, a guitarist-vocalist with Champaign-Urbana’s Braid. "Just touring
and stuff, we see a lot of new bands out on tour that don’t have any records
out and still survive and do tours and maybe even break even. We see a lot of
brand new bands out touring that shouldn’t be touring. We see younger kids who
didn’t understand how alternative decimated the punk scene, and older kids who
might have turned it up a notch because of the whole backlash from the alternative
thing, and it’s inspiring."
Braid came together in 1993 when Nanna stepped out from behind the drum set he
manned for a band called Friction. It survived numerous personnel changes and
earned a reputation as a hard-working touring unit, pausing only long enough
to record a handful of EPs, split EPs, and three albums (Frame & Canvas, The
Age of Octeen, and Frankie Welfare Boy Age 5). In addition to the driving, challenging
music, all of these discs are marked by an extremely poetic and sophisticated
approach to lyrics more or less as "mini-screenplays" for movies of the mind.
"Chris [Broach] and I write all the lyrics," Nanna says. "What we usually do
is when we feel inspired we’ll just start writing stuff down, whatever comes
to our heads, and when it comes time to write songs we’ll just pick whatever
seems to make sense with the feeling of the music. It just kind of naturally
happens. There’s definitely a climax to all of our songs, and I really enjoy
a lot of the cinematic qualities that occur in songs, like Jawbreaker-type songs
and Jets to Brazil. Lyrically I really admire the storytelling quality."
- Jim DeRogatis
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“Age of Octeen, the band’s second full length, released on Champaign’s MUD Records,
really showed the band coming into their own in terms of style, and the quality
of material was leaps and bounds above FWBA5. What made the difference? ‘Maturity,
if you want to call it that - musically I guess - because it was the first album
that we all wrote together, and it was only really a year’s worth of material.
We were also touring a lot more and worrying about getting older.’” Lost At Sea
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